A subdivision of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), the ISNA Political Awareness Committee (ISNA-PAC) -- also known as the ISNA Political Action Committee -- was created in 1987 to promote the injection of Muslim values into American political and social institutions. The Committee was never able to gain much traction, however. In his 1997 book, Competing Voices of Islam in the United States, Kambiz GhaneaBassiri, Reed University professor of Islamic Studies, explained:

"The ISNA-PAC has not been very successful for several reasons. Many Muslims are not eligible to vote, hence their voices are often ignored by legislators. Furthermore, many Muslims do not advocate any form of participation in American politics; they fear that political activities will lead to assimilation and eventually result in corruption. Muslim political organizations also encounter a sense of apathy when working for Islamic or Muslim causes amid the Muslim population.... [P]erhaps the most important reason why Muslims have not been successful in their political activities is that they rarely agree on political agendas and thus are unable to form voting blocs."

Though it is now defunct, ISNA-PAC was named in a May 1991 Muslim Brotherhood document -- titled "An Explanatory Memorandum on the General Strategic Goal for the Group in North America" -- as one of the Brotherhood’s 29 likeminded "organizations of our friends" that shared the common goal of destroying America and turning it into a Muslim nation. These "friends" were identified by the Brotherhood as groups that could help teach Muslims "that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and 'sabotaging' its miserable house by their hands ... so that ... God's religion [Islam] is made victorious over all other religions."